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Chinese and Indian Investment in Ethiopia: Infrastructure for ‘Debt-Trap

Diplomacy’ Exchange and the Land Grabbing Approach

Article  in  International Journal of Emerging Markets · July 2021

DOI: 10.2139/ssrn.3618613

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 A G D I Working Paper

WP/20/029
Chinese and Indian investment in Ethiopia: Infrastructure for ‘debt-trap
diplomacy’ exchange and the land grabbing approach 1

Forthcoming: International Journal of Emerging Markets

Amsalu K. Addis
School of Economics and Management,Fuzhou University, Fuzhou, China
P.O.Box: 2 Xueyuan Road, Minhou, Fujian,Fuzhou,350116, CN
E-mails: amy.kid370@gmail.com, amy.kid370@fzu.edu.cn
Tel: +86-152 8007 6673

Simplice A. Asongu
African Governance and Development Institute,
P.O. Box 8413, Yaoundé, Cameroon
E-mails: asongusimplice@yahoo.com,asongus@afridev.org
Tel: +32473613172

Zhu Zuping
School of Economics and Management,
Fuzhou University, Fuzhou, China
E-mails: zhuzuping@163.com
Tel: +86-137 0697 6655

Hailu Kendie Addis

Amhara Regional Agricultural Research Institute,
Bahir Dar –Ethiopia
E-mail: hailukendie@gmail.com
Tel: +251-918 711082

Eshetu Shifaw
Wollo University, Department of Geography and
Environmental Studies,Wollo – Ethiopia
E-mail: eshetushifaw@yahoo.com
Tel: +251-912777193

1
This working paper also appears in the Development Bank of Nigeria Working Paper Series.

1
2020 African Governance and Development Institute WP/20/029

Research Department

Chinese and Indian investment in Ethiopia: Infrastructure for ‘debt-trap diplomacy’

exchange and the land grabbing approach

Amsalu K. Addis, Simplice A. Asongu, Zhu Zuping, Hailu Kendie Addis & Eshetu
Shifaw

January 2020

Abstract
Purpose: The aim of this study is to examine the motive of China’s and India’s engagement
in African countries particularly in Ethiopia, and to address the land grabbing and debt-trap
diplomacy between Ethiopia and the Asian drivers, which creates challenges across the
diverse social, political, economic, and ecological contexts.

Methodology/approach: This study utilises both primary and secondary data. The available
literature is also reviewed. The primary data were gathered through semi-structured
interviews and discussions from: (i) several authority offices in Ethiopia, sources close to
authorities, information-rich informants, employees, and (ii) perspectives, perceptions, and
prospects from individual members of society.

Findings: The study unmasks the win-win cooperation strategy from the perspective of the
members of society in Ethiopia, evaluates whether China and India have strings attached or
land grabbing motives. The study also shows that whether China’s and India’s move was
deliberate, the implications of debt-trap diplomacy and exploitation in Ethiopia are apparent.
Additionally, this study investigated several considerable potential threats to Ethiopia that
will persist unless significant measures are taken to control the relations with Asian drivers.

Limitations: Some of the limitations of this paper pertain to the primary data collection
process from the Ethiopian Investment Commission (EIC) and other authorities, which was
very challenging because people can be punished for talking to journalists or researchers.
Furthermore, some investors were not willing to participate in discussions because they were
engaged in areas that are not related to their licenses. Many interviewees were also not
willing to disclose their names, and the data are not exhaustive in the number of investment
projects covered.

Originality/value: This study provides new evidence on the influence of Chinese and Indian
investment, aid and trade on Ethiopia's social, political, and economic spheres. Additionally,
this study contributes to the ongoing debate on land grabbing anddebt-trap diplomacy in
Ethiopia.

Keywords: Ethiopia, China, India, Land grabbing, Investment, Debt-trap diplomacy

2
Introduction

Since the beginning of the 21stcentury, economic development in Africa has drawn
worldwide attention, and investments and cooperation by Chinese and Indian private and
state-funded enterprises in Africa have been rapidly increasing (Addis and Zuping, 2019). To
date, as many journalistic accounts describe, Chinese and Indian enterprises, especially
privately owned enterprises, are increasingly pressing to enter Africa, invest and operate in
the continent, this issue has produced two schools of thoughts: optimistic and
pessimistic(Addis and Zuping, 2019). The optimistic strand of the academic literature
describes both China and India as establishing and developing new types of short- and long-
term stable and mutually beneficial partnerships and providing various sound mechanisms for
trade, aid, and economic cooperation with Africa (McCormick, 2008; Nowak, 2016; Panda,
2016). Whether these partnerships and mechanisms will be sustainable, however, remains to
be seen. On the other hand, the pessimistic strand of literature criticizes China and India for
exploiting the continent’s energy resources and dominant markets with a neo-colonialist
approach (Addis and Zuping, 2018; Fung and Garcia-Herrero, 2012; Hules and Singh, 2017;
Kolstad and Wiig, 2011; Zhao, 2011). Both strands in the literature are articulated along
whether the Asian drivers are aiming to follow a ‘new scramble for Africa’ (Carmody, 2016),
or whether a contemporary proxy for the old colonial system is occurring (Addis and Zuping,
2018).
Additionally, direct investment in and aid to Africa from the Asian drivers have led to
intense discussions. Some studies offer important insights into the underlying economic,
political, and social dynamics that give rise to these issues (Hugon, 2011; Panda, 2016).
Others have shown that the distribution of Indian and Chinese investments in Africa is too
concentrated in energy- and resource-rich countries, the total amount of investment is
relatively small, and some investment projects do not correspond to Africa's actual
development (Paul, 2014; Shinn, 2012; Zhao, 2013). Scholars explicitly observed that

Although conventional analysis still tends to regard Africa as a monolithic

continent, not all African countries are on an equal footing when it comes to
reaping the benefits of higher commodity prices spurred by China and India’s
demand for commodities. Far from being homogeneously rich in natural
resources, there are big differences among African trade patterns at the country
level (Goldstein et al., 2009, 1539).

3
One challenge to understanding the impact of Chinese and Indian investments in Africa is the
lack of a consensus on the appropriate definition of the attendant investments in the literature.
Academics, journalists and observers sometimes commingle foreign direct investment (FDI)
with the multibillion-dollar loans from emerging Asian powers, particularly from China and
India, to African countries. These loans are often used by Chinese and Indian state-owned
enterprises (SOEs) and private companies to facilitate the continent’s infrastructure (Shinn,
2012). This can be considered as a ‘debt-trap’ to the host country and the concessional loans
often target resource-rich African countries. Thus, it is important to consider FDI and these
multibillion-dollar loans separately.
However, it should be noted that these emerging Asian powers do sometimes enter
non-resource-rich countries, such as Ethiopia, to make investments or provide aid. The
question is do the Asian drivers benefit Ethiopia or is it just a showcase for other African
countries because the capital city, Addis Ababa, is the third diplomatic city in the world only
2
after New York and Geneva? Accordingly, the headquarters of many multilateral
development institutions are based in the capital of Ethiopia, inter alia, the: United Nations
Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) and Pan African Chamber of Commerce and
Industries (PACCI) (Wubneh, 2013). Precisely, Addis Ababa, the capital of Ethiopia, is a
valuable regional launch pad to Beijing and New Delhi.
With these issues in mind, many studies have criticized China and India as engaging
in Africa hastily. These studies take various perspectives, including the land grabbing
approach (Abbink, 2011; Hules and Singh, 2017; Schoneveld, 2016), energy and resource
seeking perspective (Bräutigam, 2009; HZhao, 2013), the new scramble for Africa (Carmody,
2016; Scholvin, 2016), infrastructure for resource exchange (Alves, 2013; Kolstad and Wiig,
2011; Paul, 2014), infrastructure for diplomatic exchange (Adem, 2012; Cabestan, 2012),
attracted by corrupted governments or resource-rich countries (Fung and Garcia-Herrero,
2012), aid donor-recipient relations (McCormick, 2008), ideological relations, neo-
colonialism approach (Addis and Zuping, 2018)and ‘debt-trap diplomacy’ (Parker and
Chefitz, 2018).

2
According to Yahoo Finance published article on October 18, 2016 by AbdiLatifDahir,
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/one-world-most-important-diplomatic-133810896.html (Accessed
July 30, 2018)

4
 Furthermore, China's loans to Africa have provoked criticism. Several African
countries are trapped in debt to China and have become significantly vulnerable to debt
distress (Bavier, 2019). For instance, between 2000 and 2015, China loaned a whopping
US$95.5 billion to the continent (Mead, 2018). According to Vasquez from the top African
recipient countries with the largest Chinese debt, Ethiopia is the second next to Angola with a
roughly amount of debt of US$13 billion, which is 16% of its total GDP (Vasquez, 2019).
Likewise, India is practicing debt-trap diplomacy in Ethiopia’s sugar projects and this paper
will discuss it in detail. Borrowing may not bring risks to Ethiopia; the genuine concern is,
would the projects generate enough funds to repay the loans or are the projects more seen in
terms of diplomatic and political values? Would the profitability of the projects be assessed
before the loan agreement: (i) in a way that makes economic and financial sense to the
country or (ii) by specific interests surrounding the government officials’ and the donors’
political diplomatic relations?
China and India have recently gained attention in the world economy. The
developments that China and India have brought to some African countries have had
significant positive impacts(Addis and Zuping, 2019). Nonetheless, their growing presence in
Africa and the rise in their demands for energy, raw materials, and food have become global
issues. To satisfy these needs, resource-rich African countries and corrupt countries have
become major targets and Chinese and Indian migrants flow to these countries in accordance
with the countries’ economic opportunity intensities(Goldstein et al., 2006; Kolstad and
Wiig, 2011; Fung and Garcia-Herrero, 2012). Moreover, several of the Chinese and Indian
enterprises use African countries as learning fields for developing their strategic management
experience. As a result, serious questions have been raised about the sustainability of African
development and the investment flows from the Asian drivers to Africa.
To help address these questions, this study presents the current approaches of the
Asian drivers in Ethiopia as a case study. The purpose of this study is to: (i)provide new
evidence on the influence of Chinese and Indian aid, trade, concessional loan, and investment
to Ethiopia's social, political, economic, and ecological sphere; (ii)to examine the motive of
China’s and India’s engagement in African countries particularly in Ethiopia, which is seen
both as an opportunity and a threat; (iii)to unmask the win-win cooperation strategy from the
perspective of the members of society in Ethiopia, and (iv) to clarify the implications of debt-
trap diplomacy, land grabbing motives and exploitation in Ethiopia. There are very few
empirical studies that analyse the opportunities and challenges of China’s and India’s

5
growing role in Ethiopia. This paper therefore contributes to the on-going debate on land
grabbing, debt-trap diplomacy and political strings attached issues in Ethiopia. It identifies
the investment scenario of Ethiopia in the light of China and India, thereby analysing whether
China or India is able to create economically significant or uneconomical investments in
Ethiopia. Authors believe that this study makes a significant contribution to the literature
because Ethiopia’s positive or negative diplomatic, economic, social and ecological change s
due to the Asian driver’s motivations have implications for other developing African nations.

Methodology, limitations and questions of the study

This study utilises both primary and secondary data. Available literature is also reviewed.
The primary data were gathered through interviews and discussions from the Ethiopian
Investment Commission (EIC), sources close to authorities in the Ministry of Agriculture
(MOA), the Ethiopian Ministry of Finance and Economic Development (MoFED), key
informants, employees, and individual members of society who have personal experiences,
perceptions, and prospects.. Semi-structured interviews were utilized to delve deeply into
sensitive issues, to collect qualitative and open-ended data and to explore participant beliefs,
thoughts and feelings about the study. An attempt was made to the purposefully identification
and selection of 50 local employees in the Chinese and Indian companies, 20 ordinary
societies, 10 information-rich informants, several staffs of the Ethiopian Institute of
Agricultural Research (EIAR), local Chinese language translators, businesspersons, investors,
and private company managers both for the interview and discussion participants.
There is a scarcity of literature on the land grab, political strings attached and the debt
trap diplomacy issue as a case study for Ethiopia. We utilize the mix of methodologies as a
strategically-sound approach to investigate and unmask whether the mentioned issues prevail,
provide potential problem-solving points and pave the road for future research works. The
methodologies additionally assist to ascertain the impacts of the Asian drivers’ activities on
local development. Our goal is to investigate what is actually happening on the ground. In
designing this study our objective was to look beyond the Ethiopian, Chinese and Indian
government dramatic allegations, hidden agendas and official proclamations that portray
some of the media coverage. An appropriate way to fully understand the concerns is to
engage closely with local and foreign discussion participants. Simultaneously, the study
bridges the gap between the media and scholarly literature.

6
 Furthermore, this study raises fundamental questions and answered them based on a
qualitative methodological approach. Which problems would the Chinese and Indian FDI
inflows to Ethiopia address? Are these issues to be addressed related to poverty, technology
transfer, employment opportunities, or just related to the generation of foreign capital? Can
the government of Ethiopia fill the void by leveraging on FDI-related external flows without
an increase in skilled human capital and self-reliance? Can the FDI inflows from Asian
drivers to Ethiopia stimulate the country's industrialization? Would leasing large sizes of land
to FDI projects transform the Ethiopian economy without an increase in environmental
degradation, villagization, and hunger of the society? Who is responsible for Ethiopia’s
growing debt burden, Chinese, Indian or the government itself? Would Ethiopia’s
development projects that have been contracted by the Chinese and Indian companies be able
to generate enough financial resources with which to repay the loans or they are just a debt-
trap? What is the local person’s perspective of investment projects from the two Asian
countries in comparison with investment projects from some western countries based on skill
and technology transfer, human capital development and employees wage? Why human
capital investments related to these foreign projects are fewer in the country compared to
other investment sectors?
Some of the limitations of this paper are, inter alia: (i) the primary data collection
from EIC and other authorities is very challenging, and the data covered certain number of
investment projects, (ii) some investors are not willing to participate in discussions because
they engaged in areas that are not related to their licenses, and (iii) several interviewees were
not willing to disclose their names because people can be punished for talking to journalists
or researchers. Thus, we found that anonymisation was particularly important because
participants shared personal and very sensitive information, not only about themselves, but
also about third parties.

Ethiopia’s agricultural sector and inward FDI

Agriculture in Ethiopia accounts for more than 80% of total employment,45% of GDP and
over 70% of foreign exchange due to exports (Abraret al., 2004; Baye, 2017;Matouš et al.,
2013). Although Ethiopia has rich agricultural resources, however, it unfortunately has low
production and resource utilisation. Thus, strengthening agricultural infrastructure,
simplifying the bureaucracy around the development of agricultural investments, agro
industries and strengthening human capital development are among the major goals for

7
alleviating poverty and creating stable and sustainable growth of Ethiopia’s national
economy.
Despite these goals, however, most of the region's agricultural productions are still
relatively traditional. To improve the traditional mode of agricultural production and advance
the level of productivity, agricultural manufacturing and infrastructure need to be improved
and special attention has to be paid to attract more FDI.A few studies noted that the Ethiopian
government has cooperated with many foreign countries and non-governmental organisations
in various ways at different times. For instance, Ethiopia and the Asian drivers have a good
foundation for agricultural, scientific, and technological cooperation (Lumumba-Kasongo,
2011). This study, however, focuses on the outcomes that have been achieved in the
agricultural sector so far, as evidence of the impact of this agricultural cooperation with the
Asian drivers is sparse.
With the rapid growth of Ethiopia’s population and the acceleration of the
urbanisation process, the country is demanding major FDI inflows in the agricultural sector.
Nevertheless, several of the MOA observers in the discussion engaged in Addis Ababa
between January 2016 and November 2017 commented that the FDI inflow into this
particular sector is not playing a beneficiary role to Ethiopia given that India is suspected of
using a land grabbing approach. The land gabbing approach and destitute agricultural
infrastructure worsened by lack of potential FDI has challenged Ethiopia’s ability to emerge
from the poverty cycle.
Furthermore, little has been done to transform Ethiopia’s peasant agriculture. This
lack of infrastructure restricts the country’s development of agricultural specialisation,
urbanisation, modernisation, and industrialisation (Bernardet al., 2008). However, with the
new millennium goals, several favourable conditions for the development of Ethiopia’s
agriculture have started to flourish, such as the expansion of telecommunications and the
improvement of information hubs, transportation and road improvements, electric power grid
interconnections, and a growing demand for domestic and foreign agricultural investment
(Dorosh and Rashidi, 2013). The extent to which this infrastructure will become a solution
for Ethiopia’s increasing population, food demand and alluring FDI remains to be seen.
According to the EIC, roughly 823 investment projects were licensed in the
agricultural sector from 1992 to 2016. Of these, only 271 projects become operational (see
Table 1). During this period, the Chinese and Indian operational agricultural FDI projects are
2 and 37 respectively (see Table 2). This clearly shows that the share of the Asian countries

8
in the agriculture sector is below 15%. Given the size of the land and the lease period ranges
that Ethiopia provides for agricultural sector investors between 20 and 50 years, (see Table 3)
the country’s economy still primarily depends on agriculture (Abrar et al., 2004; Matouš et
al., 2013). To the worst case, in recent years, the actual implementation rate of FDI projects
in the agricultural sector has decreased dramatically, whereas those in the manufacturing and
construction sectors have increased to some extent.

Table 1: In here

Owing to the conducive investment environment and generous incentive packages to

investors, FDI flows into the country from China and India have been growing. According to
the EIC, the number of registered Chinese and Indian investors is increasing dramatically
compared with investors from other countries. However, based on a discussion in the capital,
Addis Ababa, between January 2016 and November 2017, some informants from the MOA
and the EIC witnessed that many of the Chinese and Indian investment projects failed to go to
the actual implementation phases of the licenced projects because the attendant investors
cancelled their licences after receiving incentive packages. Pre-Implementation investment
means that the company has already acquired all the necessary requisites for the project to
begin operation but has not started yet. Thus, land grabbing can be assumed as securing of
land through long term leasing contracts without starting the actual implementation phase of
the corresponding investment.

Table 2: In here

The inflow of investment from Asian drivers to Ethiopia

With the introduction of the market economy, Ethiopia has embarked on a series of reform
measures, including foreign trade liberalisation, the privatisation of state-owned enterprises,
the devaluation of the exchange rate, and the abolition of domestic price controls (Worku,
2018). As a case study, Chinese and Indian investment impacts in Ethiopia will be discussed
in this section.

Chinese investment

Most of the investment capital coming from China to Ethiopia is either wholly or partially

9
state-owned. Strong funding, government support (Fijałkowski, 2011; Geiger and Goh,2012),
and the introduction of the ‘Go Global’ and ‘Open Door’ policies, 3 have triggered Chinese
overseas investment and invigorated the national economy (Drogendijk and Blomkvist, 2013;
X. Zhao, 2015). Although there are fewer Chinese state-owned enterprises (SOEs) than
private enterprises, the SOEs are large and dominant (Yi-Chong, 2014). These enterprises are
acknowledged as fundamental to the Chinese Communist Party and the Chinese government
(Chintu and Williamson, 2013). Through either the monopolisation of natural resources or the
significant involvement of Chinese development aid packages, SOEs typically win bids for
infrastructure construction or other contract projects in African countries (Bartholomew,
2012). Moreover, the SOEs would finance the host country to commence various projects as
a tactical move to get involved in the attendant projects. For instance, ‘In 2005, the China
Development Bank created a $1 billion Africa Trade and Investment Fund, but the trade and
investment initiatives funded cannot take place without the significant involvement of Chinese
suppliers’(Bartholomew, 2012). This can be mentioned as debt-trap diplomacy.
China has numerous investment enterprises in sub-Saharan Africa, particularly in
Ethiopia (Adem, 2012; Jobson, 2013; Zhang et al., 2014). As noted by an Al Jazeera article
published on October 26, 2015, the figures on Chinese investments in Ethiopia indicate that
from 1992-2015, private operational Chinese investments were at least US$773 million and
the EIC confirmed that Chinese investment in Ethiopia has been growing since 1998. In
2001, the total value of Chinese investment projects that were in the operational phase and
under project implementation was estimated at nearly US$0.5 million (Addis and Zuping,
2019). This value reached US$107 million in 2004, and, in 2007, cumulative investment
capital reached US$118 million (Addis and Zuping, 2019).
Many people ask why China is attracted to Ethiopia, a land-locked country with few
energy resources. Several studies indicate that having energy resources is not the only reason
that makes the host country an investment destination. Some other essential characteristics
which Ethiopia has are, inter alia: an enormous market demand, a flexible labour market,
locational advantage, investment initiatives and conducive policy measures (Cabestan, 2012;
Seyoum and Lin, 2015). Specifically, Hess and Aidoo wrote that:

3
Go Global (走出去 / Zǒuchūqū) is China’s current policy to encourage its competitive enterprises to invest
abroad and is a proactive part of China’s Open Door strategy. Similarly, Open Door policy was adopted
by Deng Xiaoping, head of leadership in the late 1970s to open the door to foreign enterprises that wanted
to establish in China.

10
 Unique among China’s leading partners in sub-Saharan Africa, Ethiopia has not
attracted Chinese investment through much-needed energy resources. Instead, it
has emerged as an attractive consumer market for Chinese manufactured goods, a
stable environment for Chinese investment and a launching pad for Chinese firms
seeking to expand their reach out of China and into foreign markets (Hess and
Aidoo, 2015, 79).

Similarly, Adem also claims that ‘Ethiopia, for instance, exports neither oil nor other
minerals critical for China and is not also a major exporter of timber – another important
commodity China imports from Africa’ (Adem, 2010, 337). Nevertheless, China has
committed to large-scale infrastructure projects in Ethiopia because political strings are
attached (Hess and Aidoo, 2015, 79). Likewise, Ganesan says, ‘Many scholars when they
discuss the FDI in Africa, they consider the natural resources like mineral and oil resources
as the most important attractive feature, but Ethiopia is lacking in this area’ (Ganesan, 2015,
22).
Currently, according to the EIC over 1,000 Chinese investment projects are licensed
but only 593 projects are fully operational (Addis and Zuping, 2019). These projects have
created more than 52,559 permanent jobs and 52,289 temporary jobs for Ethiopians(Addis
and Zuping, 2019). It is relevant to note that, these are projected job opportunities at the time
licenses are granted by the Ethiopian government and by extension, do not reflect the actual
figures after the actual implementation of the projects because of lack of follow-up and
weaknesses in governance (Addis and Zuping, 2019). As generating employment is a benefit
from Chinese investment that Ethiopian nations eagerly await, nevertheless, there are
concerns in the local society about skill and technology transfer, and the huge amount of
Chinese contract labour being employed over the local people. A local Chinese translator
named Solomon has articulated his concern in an interview in Addis Ababa on September 13,
2017 that ‘There are plenty of Chinese workers in some projects who engaged in a similar
work as the local employees.’ Similarly, several participants in the discussion also agreed
with Solomon’s perception (discussed later).
Presently, China is simultaneously Ethiopia’s top import and export partner. Ethiopian
exports to China have grown rapidly, and the bilateral trade between the two countries has
quickly expanded, but Ethiopia still suffers from a huge and increasing trade deficit(Addis
and Zuping, 2019). Similarly, the trade balance continues to be tilted in favour of China
(Cabestan, 2012; Hess and Aidoo, 2015). Comparatively, Chinese investment in Ethiopia is

11
increasing significantly and their investment projects in the country focus on the
manufacturing, infrastructure, and real estate construction sectors, although the quality of
these projects drives citizenry discontent. Chinese individuals also controlled small
enterprises in Ethiopia, such as hotels, clinics, barber shops, brickworks, small farms and
even retail shops, which could be run by Ethiopians (Addis and Zuping, 2019). Moreover,
some local Ethiopian societies have voiced concerns about persistently high levels of Chinese
presence in the country.
The Ethiopian government embraces China as a shield from its political and human
rights issues and as a back-up to Western and European aid (Hess and Aidoo, 2015, 79).
Similarly, China embraces Ethiopia because of its: (i) regional and continental role, (ii)
strategically important location,(iii) economically undeveloped nature, (iv) large population
which is the second in Africa and (v) lack of domestically manufactured goods (Cabestan,
2012; Hess and Aidoo, 2015). Generally, Ethiopia is found attractive for China's ‘soft power’
as well as its other policies.
Consequently, China's presence in Ethiopia is not only through aid, investment, trade
and loans but also via soft power. In fact, the government-funded Confucius Institutes are
established in many African countries not only to further spread Chinese language and
culture to local African students, but also, it is believed, to reflect China’s soft power and
enhance diplomatic ties between China and Africa (Akhtaruzzaman et al., 2017; Hartig,
2015). Ethiopia has more than five universities that provide a bachelor’s degree in the
Chinese language, including Addis Ababa University, Mekelle University, and Hawassa
University among others and the Confucius Institute is controlling the Chinese language
department by engaging with these universities (Addis and Zuping, 2019).The fact that the
Confucius Institute is permitted to operate within the premises of these top national
educational institutions in the country is a surprise to many. It has been argued that the
Confucius Institute is successfully serving China’s interests in its foreign collaborations
(Hartig, 2015). Moreover, Ethio-China polytechnic college was built by a Chinese
government educational aid project in Addis Ababa to facilitate learning the Chinese
language, culture, and other related matters (Niu, 2016). In sum, China has funded a number
of infrastructure projects in Ethiopia and become a prime investor and major trade partner
with Ethiopia. However, China’s current actions raise questions, such as why China is so
interested in Ethiopia, for common development or debt-trap diplomacy and whether political
strings are attached.

12
Indian investment

India’s first overseas joint venture, the Birla Group, was set up as a textile mill in Ethiopia
sanctioned in 1959. At the time, this group was the second largest business conglomerate in
India (Gupta, 2016, 110). Little effort has been made to attract investors from India after the
Birla Group, but according to the Indian embassy in Ethiopia, from 1992 to 2011, a total of
US$4.78 billion licensed Indian investment were apparent across nearly 600 investment
projects (Schellhase, 2013). Of this total, less than 27% of investment projects were currently
operational, and the amount of operational investment in the pipeline was roughly US$1
billion (Schellhase, 2013).
According to the EIC, by mid-2016, the number of operational Indian investment
projects increased to 284 projects across various sectors (Addis and Zuping, 2019). These
investment projects created more than 17,954 permanent and 25,283 temporary jobs for
Ethiopians (Addis and Zuping, 2019). It is worthwhile to note that these are companies’
estimated job creation avenues at the time of licensing and the actual number of jobs created
after the licensing is not reported. The Indian investment projects actively participated in
large-scale commercial agro-industry and farms, with very large working premises (over
600,000 hectares of land) relative to other foreign investors (Vidal, 2013). These projects
have led to the displacement of approximately 8,000 tribal people in the Gambella region
only (Reporter, 2013; Chandran and Gardner, 2017; Nalepa et al., 2017; Tura, 2018;Wubneh,
2018).Yet, there is no record of outcomes from the projects that could benefit the indigenous
people.
Many people ask what drives Indian agricultural firms to Ethiopia, land rush? India is
the second most populous country in the world, and its ability to feed its 1.34 billion people is
under increasing strain. Clearly, the land rush issue is due to the world food and financial
crises in addition to politically and economically driven motives (Weissleder, 2009; Nalepa et
al., 2017). India’s rapidly growing population, agricultural policy failures, and low
agricultural productivity can be also another reason for the land rush to Ethiopia. Other
reasons may include rapid urbanisation, reductions in farm sizes, the failure of institutional
delivery of credit to farmers, and declining water levels. Similarly, many people ask how
Ethiopia benefits from offering large-scale leases of land for a prolonged period of time to
Indian investors at almost no cost. Surprisingly, Indian investment companies produce crops,
such as flowers, sugar cane, oil seeds, and cotton (see table 3), that provide little food value
to local inhabitants. Thus, Ethiopia does not receive major benefits to emerge from the

13
poverty cycle. This situation also drove the recent accusations toward vandalism of Indian-
owned farms in Ethiopia by local inhabitants (Yibeltal, 2014; Chandran and Gardner, 2017).
Since 1992, Agricultural Development–Led Industrialisation (ADLI)has been a
guiding framework for poverty alleviation and national agricultural modernisation and a
foundation of the Ethiopian government’s economic policy (Zewdie, 2015). The government
considers the ADLI strategy as an overarching policy response to Ethiopia’s agricultural
productivity and food security challenges (Zewdie, 2015). However, serious concerns have
been raised regarding a large-scale ‘land-grabbing’ approach and the potentially devastating
social and environmental impacts of commercial agriculture expansion among civil society
groups across various academic and scholarly studies in an array of publications (Abbink,
2011; Crewett and Korf, 2008; Moreda, 2015; Wubneh, 2018). In light of these concerns, in a
set of interviews between January 2016 and November 2017, several critics and scholars
questioned whether industrialisation in Ethiopia was possible through the ADLI.
As Indian investors are accused of repurposing Ethiopia’s arable land for the aim of
commercial agricultural expansion, this situation challenges the principle of South-South
cooperation between Ethiopia and India (Smith, 2014; Vidal, 2013; Chandran and Gardner,
2017; Nalepa et al., 2017). Indeed, Indian investment in the agricultural sector is the largest
form of FDI in Ethiopia, with over 30% of its total (Anwar, 2015), and even scholars describe
the situation as ‘The Indian Scramble for Ethiopia’ (Rahmato, 2014, 32). Some of the major
Indian investors in agro-industrial projects are listed in Table 3, and little evidence indicates
that any of these Indian investors who acquired a large land area utilised it for production
(Anwar, 2015; Wubneh, 2018). Similarly, research by the US-based Oakland Institute shows
that several thousands of indigenous people relocated to neighbouring towns and that some
fled to refugee camps in Sudan and Kenya after their fertile land was made available or
handed to foreign investors for large commercial agriculture purposes in long-term leases at
giveaway prices without their consent (Oakland Institute, 2013b; Rahmato, 2014; Vidal,
2013), an argument that is shared by some scholars (Moreda, 2015; Shete and Rutten, 2015;
Smith, 2014; Nalepa et al., 2017).
Several studies strongly argue that the actions of the Ethiopian government
concerning these long-term land leases or sales and involuntary resettlements of indigenous
people are violations of human rights (Epstein, 2013; Shete and Rutten, 2015; Vidal, 2013;
Tura, 2018; Wubneh, 2018). Particularly, Smith argues that ‘Ethiopia’s policy of leasing
millions of hectares of land to foreign investors is encouraging human rights violations,

14
ruining livelihoods and disturbing a delicate political balance between ethnic groups’
(Smith, 2014). Likewise, during his field work in 2010, Rahmato personally witnessed that
‘[...] lands in designated national parks, protected areas, and wildlife habitats have also been
given out, posing a serious threat to the country’s ecological and biodiversity resources’
(Rahmato, 2014, 31). Therefore, the Ethiopian government and society should think beyond
the land grabbing approach because the phenomenon is not limited to land grabbing but also
damages inhabitants, forests, rivers, farms, biodiversity resources, and livelihood properties
and abuses the dignity of the community (Moreda, 2015; Rahmato, 2014; Shete and Rutten,
2015; Wubneh, 2018). Consequently, Abbink mentions, ‘The only remaining role for
displaced local farmers is to be wage labourers on the foreign agro-farms, or move away to
towns or other areas’ (Abbink, 2011, 523).
Accordingly, the debates and discussions over land-ownership and large-scale land
acquisition in Ethiopia have become more and more intense, creating even a typical battle
between the elites and peasants. Protests and critical discourse on this topic are discouraged
by the authorities. For instance, the then Prime Minister Meles Zenawi publicly declared the
land policy to be a ‘dead issue’ in the country (Crewett and Korf, 2008, 204; Rahmato and
Assefa, 2006, 108). Shortly afterward the debate was partly suppressed, and the opposition
parties and some of the proponents of privatisation were jailed (Crewett and Korf, 2008, 204;
Human Rights Watch, 2012). Since all land is under state ownership, land claims based on
spiritual and traditional means are not often acknowledged, landlordism was abolished, and
several pre-existing private commercial farms were immediately transformed into state farms
(Ghose, 1985; Wubneh, 2018).
A farmer in one of the most fertile regions, Gambella in southern Ethiopia, said in an
interview on August 24, 2016, ‘Losing the land was losing everything for me and my family,
however, if the government forces us to leave our own land, which our ancestors passed to
us, what can we do?’ On the other hand, in interviews and discussions in Addis Ababa
between January 2016 and November 2017, several local people explained that the
government does not discuss the situation with the community before ‘villagisation’ and
gives away their land. Similarly, Obang Metho, the Executive Director of the Grassroots
Social Justice Movement with Solidarity Movement for a New Ethiopia argues, ‘When the
Ethiopian government met with them [the investors], the local people were never consulted
and were never compensated. Literally, the decision was made without involving the people’

15
(Oakland Institute, 2013a, 7). Other studies also reached a similar conclusion (Abbink, 2011;
Moreda, 2015; Rahmato, 2014).
Unquestionably, FDI in the agricultural sector should aim to increase economic
power, accomplish Ethiopia’s rural poverty alleviation plan, and allow for technology
transfers and agricultural growth rather than to acquire a large land area to enjoy Ethiopia’s
agricultural resources and low wage labour. Nonetheless, in an interview on July 23, 2016, a
source close to the MoFED authority said, ‘Indian investors are given huge land size with the
justification that they are better endowed in technology and capital and are more likely to be
successful in their operations, but only less than 40% of the given land currently cultivated’.
Similarly, some staff of the Ethiopian Institute of Agricultural Research (EIAR) in the
discussion shares the argument.

Table 3: In here

Furthermore, since 1995, Ethiopia has been divided into ten administrative regions based on
ethnic lines. A larger share of India’s, China’s, Saudi Arabia’s, Turkey’s, and other countries’
agricultural investment projects takes place in five of these administrative regions: Amhara
and Afar in the north, Benishangul-Gumuzin the north-western, Oromia in Central Ethiopia,
and Gambella and the SNNPR in the south part of Ethiopia (Abbink, 2011, 518; Hules and
Singh, 2017, 347; Oakland Institute, 2013b, 2; Tura, 2018; Wubneh, 2018).

The perspective of society towards the Asian drivers approach

Ethiopia relies on imports from abroad, and most high-end consumer goods are imported.
Some of these goods have never been produced in Ethiopia, and almost all of them are
directly imported from China and India. Simultaneously, these imported substitutes are often
overproduced in these Asian drivers and are particularly suitable for their enterprises to shift
their production capacity to Africa in general and Ethiopia in particular. According to the
Ethiopian Investment Proclamation No. 270/2012, the Ethiopian government allows investors
to import their investment project equipment, spare parts, and raw materials with tax-
exemption (Addis and Zuping, 2019).
One observer in the capital, Addis Ababa, noted in an interview on November 23,
2017 that China has made substantial investments in all sectors in Ethiopia, including
construction (stadiums, hydropower generation projects, ring roads, dams, and real estate),
transportation (Addis Ababa light railway and Ethio-Djibouti electric railway), and

16
telecommunication (ZTE, Huawei) projects, among others. The observer continues,
explaining that

Nevertheless, these all projects constructed through the Chinese imported

machinery and consumer goods in the name of incentives and duty-free
privileges. Besides, they deployed a mix of professional and unprofessional
Chinese workers for their projects instead of hiring the locals. The only thing they
left behind is used machineries and finished projects, but not the skill and
technique.

Conversely, in the interviews and discussions made with several civil servants, local
societies, and information-rich informants in Addis Ababa between January 2016 and
November 2017, many of them described their wish to have more European and Western
countries investment projects in Ethiopia and suggested that the Ethiopian government has to
see other opportunities as the country has challenges in poverty alleviation and skilful human
capital development. In a phone interview on October19, 2017, Nathnael Tsadik, the founder
and managing director of Nathnael Business and Real Estate Properties, commented
regarding the local perception of the Chinese investment presence that ‘Not only the
government of Ethiopia, but also several people values the Chinese investment projects but
they offer low wage and skill transfer is very limited.’
A resident,woman in her late 20s,who wished to be unnamed, is a self-taught Chinese
interpreter and a native speaker of Amharic (Ethiopia’s national language) and Afaan
Oromoo. This person has been working on different Chinese projects for more than six years
as a full-time interpreter including, China Railway Group Limited (CREC), which built Addis
Ababa light railway; China Communications Construction Company Ltd. (CCCC), which
was contracted for Addis Ababa’s highways, ring roads, and airport construction projects;
China Jiangxi Corporation for International Economic and Technical Corporation, which is
currently building an international stadium in Addis Ababa; and some other Chinese SOEs. In
an interview on August 21, 2016, this individual said,

I have witnessed several offensives to moral sensibilities and bad injurious

reputation situations, which I do not want to mention but in general mostly
Chinese project foreman denied providing the personal protective equipment
(PPE) to employees and the employees become injured or worse. Some are fired

17
 for slight mistakes and Chinese supervisors are fault finders instead of providing
a lesson.

Markedly, since Chinese projects are numerous in Ethiopia, the number of employees’ death
due to lack of PPE is not less. The individual continues,

On top of that, several local policemen are not willing to cooperate with the local
employees who are engaged in the Chinese projects for a low wage; even the
responsible government authorities including the Ministry of Labour and Social
Affairs are not ready to give a solution for the issues when the local employees
sue the Chinese workers.

Similarly, based on interviews conducted between January 2016 and November 2017, several
enterprise managers and businesspersons in Addis Ababa and regional cities have Sino-
optimistic attitudes and gladly describe their business opportunities with their Chinese
shareholders. However, most of them agree that Chinese investors and businesspersons, to
some extent, are a threat to the country’s foreign currency growth, as several of them use
‘WeChat pay’ and ‘Alipay’ 4 and engage in black market money transfers schemes.
Some Chinese private investors were also interviewed, including Li Wang, the owner
and director of a private electronics company, located in Mojo in the Oromia region 15
kilometres from Addis Ababa. The company registered its investment at the end of 2015,
recently finished building its factory, and is starting manufacturing electronic home
appliances and some others. Interviews were conducted during the fieldwork on June 12,
2017, Li observed the current Ethiopian investment situation

Although the vast domestic market and several investment opportunities with a
very attractive incentive provided, there are some obstacles that detain the
investment and business activities. For instance, a number of disruptive
behaviours often exhibited by the employees and this can produce risks to other
individuals, the investment and the enterprise as well.

4
WeChat is a Chinese multi-purpose texting, calling, social media and mobile payment app that developed by
Tencent Ltd. and it is also called China's ‘app for everything’ (Xu, 2017).Similar to WeChat pay, Alipay
is another third-party digital and mobile payment platform founded by the Alibaba Group(Xu, 2017).

18
In light of this, Li commented in this interview that

It is recommended to raise wages, transfer a basic knowledge, amend labour laws

to make the local employees to take on responsibilities and create some
awareness not to leave their jobs for unsatisfied reasons. Otherwise, it will make
the workflow difficult, disorganise the management of employees, discourage the
technicians and consume time and cost.

Furthermore, several Chinese directors of logistics, construction, and manufacturing

companies, including restaurant owners, were interviewed in the Guangdong Hotel around
the Addis Ababa Bole international airport area on November 23, 2016 in the evening early
before dinner time. Although these directors have various prospects, one commented that
‘Only too few foreign exchange enterprises have been created in the country, this is directly
affecting the import of raw materials and supportive inputs of the investment projects, plus
the production capacity of the existing enterprises become insufficient.’ This viewpoint also
reflects those of other interviewees. Thus, this interviewee argued that, in general, a shortage
of foreign exchange and high bureaucracy regarding the import-export process is reflected in
the country. Likewise, many interviewees from this discussion agree that ‘obviously, the
potential of Ethiopia's market is enormous, but there is corruption among government
officials, slowness, and bureaucratic of procedures.’ Finally, this group suggested, ‘the
employee skill gap in higher private and government offices results from a lack of training,
and, thus, the responsible body must implement a skill competency assessment to minimise
the gap.’
Incidentally, Indian investment in Ethiopia has been criticised as a scramble for
Ethiopia’s arable land. Even though the demand for land has been growing since the 1990s, a
significant increase in the demand for agricultural land by foreign investors began in 2006
and led to a mad rush in 2008 (Abbink, 2011; Wubneh, 2018). Indian investors began
requesting large tracts of land measuring over 50,000 hectares. The MOA data indicates India
currently has the largest foreign holdings of land, including 100,000 hectares of land held by
Emami Agro-Tech Products Limited Company (see Table 3). The 300,000 hectares of land
held by Karuturi Global Agro Products Ltd. in the Gambella region was put on hold and
much of the land taken back from government, based on non-compliance with the investment
plan provided by the company. The large-scale farming programs, which were formulated by
the government of Ethiopia directly opposes the objectives of the country’s Growth and

19
Transformation Plan (GTP), such as building social assets and infrastructure, creating local
employment opportunities, enabling technology transfers, and others by maintaining national
parks, sanctuaries, and the environment. Heretofore, little evidence indicates that any of the
objectives have been achieved, whereas the damage caused by the large-scale land
acquisition project continues to increase. The source close to the MoFED authority remarked
in the 21 July 2017 interview that

Surprisingly, a few investors have performed deforestation even burning the areas
as well they were promoted to request more farmland than they can actually
manage, and have not encountered any interferences from federal or regional
authorities that what crops the investors should grow and where they should
market their products.

Many of the staff of the Ethiopian Institute of Agricultural Research (EIAR) have also
acknowledged these issues and pronounced similar opinions.
With the help of local governments or investment authorities, the claim that Indian
agricultural sector investors are helping countries develop in the name of ‘land development,’
when their real motives are to ensure their own food security and exploit Ethiopian resources.
One myth is that the local governments or investment authorities usually mention the land is
unused or empty where no inhabitants are living but that simply is not genuine. It is naive for
investors to think that they can take away so much land and not face a backlash from
indigenous people. Moreover, large-scale land acquisition in Ethiopia is a threat to traditional
cultures and values, environmental destructions, and human rights violations. To make
matters worse, the land grab phenomenon leads to social unrest, boosts food prices, fosters
instability and conflict over scarce resources, population shifts and droughts in the
country. Lack of access to food and farmland will likely lead to political instability, social
violence and economic backwardness.
Thus, what then do the societies’ concerns tell us about the contributions of Chinese
and Indian investments in various sectors generally in African countries, particularly in
Ethiopia? Which one is accurate, the media or the society? How can we then help separate
facts from fiction? The following two sections attempt to provide answers to the underlying
questions.

20
Infrastructure for debt-trap diplomacy: China and India in Ethiopia

Debt Trap Diplomacy was introduced for the first time by an Indian professor named Brahma
Chellaney. An apparent on Project Syndicate’s website on January 23, 2017, it refers to the
loans given by China to developing countries. The phenomenon is still recent. But then,
another expression ‘Debtbook Diplomacy’ was introduced by Sam Parker and Gabrielle
Chefitz in a book published by the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at the
Harvard Kennedy School on May 24, 2018 to call attention to China’s Belt and Road
Initiative (BRI) as a debt-trap to the countries that often cannot afford to repay them(Parker
and Chefitz, 2018). Similarly, as per the guardian's Doherty, the debt-trap diplomacy broadly
defined, 'is where a creditor country intentionally lends excessive credit to smaller debt to
country, with the intention of extracting economic or political concessions when the smaller
country cannot service the loan' (Doherty, 2019).Scholars argue, uneconomic infrastructure
loan programs are aimed to lure economic or political concessions from the developing
countries and pressuring the indebted countries to support the debtor interest, just like the
Asian countries do to African countries (discussed in the next section) (Garnaut et al.,
2018). Besides, this debt-trap diplomacy also make more intense competition among the
economic countries and escort global disputes (Garnaut et al., 2018). Surprisingly, when
infrastructure for debt-trap diplomacy issue becomes viral, mostly China is the only country
mentioned by many. However, this study finds out India is also following such kind of
diplomacy.
China and to a less extent India, oversells the benefits of infrastructure projects to
African countries and offers credit to commence the projects on onerous terms via its own
EXIM Bank. The genuine concern about Chinese and Indian loans particularly to Ethiopia is
the opaqueness of the loan conditions. The conditions of the loans are often not made public
mainly in countries like Ethiopia where the process of the state securing a loan is subject to
constitutional oversight. Surprisingly, the loaned money is typically utilized to remunerate
the Chinese and Indian SOEs or private enterprises.
According to some observers, compared to organizations, such as the World Bank,
IMF, and other private and group creditor nations, loans that come from the largest single
creditor nation—China are seen as much easier, cheaper interest rates, quicker, long
repayment periods, and with fewer strings attached (BBC News, 2018). The Chinese SOEs
and private enterprises are actively scouting infrastructure projects in Ethiopia. Many
observers express their fear of Ethiopia’s move to debt-trap diplomacy and urge that Ethiopia

21
should learn a lesson from Sri Lanka's Hambantota port. An island country in South Asia, Sri
Lanka, once made the initial commitment by accepting the huge Chinese loans, and
according to the Financial Times post on December 11, 2017 the situation becomes
impossible for Sri Lanka's government to repay its huge debts and the port had become a debt
trap. Consequently, Arthur L. Herman noted on the National Review blog on December 26,
2018 that countries in the continent including Ethiopia ‘fell for China’s offer of loans to
support those infrastructure projects and soon found themselves in debt traps that they
couldn’t escape — and that China is able to use to wield political influence.’
Should Ethiopia be wary of Chinese debt? There are concerns about the debt
repayment of the inaugurated and on-going projects and clearly Ethiopia is struggling with
Chinese growing debt burden. For instance, the Addis Ababa double-track light railway that
acquired US$475 million from the EXIM Bank of China (Addis and Zuping, 2019), is barely
making profit, let alone the debt repayment, according to The Diplomat on its website on
February 13, 2018. There have been reports about a consecrated power grid, but it fails to
fully operate the system. According to observers, the frequent downturn in electricity has
caused a number of passengers in Addis Ababa to complain. Locals actually blame the light
railway for making things worse instead of easing traffic. There are 41 China funded light rail
train trucks, however, because of various problems including shortage of electric power and
spare parts the trains in use are only about half.
Likewise, the Ethio-Djibouti electric standard-gauge international railway, which is
70% of the finance secured from the EXIM Bank of China (Addis and Zuping, 2019)has
similar issues. According to Addis Fortune mentioned on May 18, 2019 on its website, the
Ethio-Djibouti Railway ceased its operation due to its second accident, which is ’Two electric
locomotives and three flatbed wagons were destroyed … The estimated cost of the damage is
between 200 million Br and 300 million Br.’ As a result, the Ethio-Djibouti railway currently
stopped its operation before beginning the repayment of its loan. The Embassy of Ethiopia in
Brussels marked on its website on September 10, 2018 that China has pledged to extend the
debt repayment period and revise interest rates for a loan it has secured to construct the Ethio-
Djibouti Railway. Generally, the country’s railway projects have been afflicted by financial
and technical challenges and have been an instructive case of both the benefits and trap of
Chinese finance.
Furthermore, the Addis Ababa-Adama expressway connects the capital city with the
city of Adama, which stretches approximately 80 Kilometers long with a six-lane-two way-

22
road. It is regarded as the first expressway ever in Ethiopia and East Africa, which was
inaugurated five years ago. According to Xinhua News noted on its website on June 20, 2019
this project is considered as Ethiopia's first accomplishment of its cooperation with China in
the implementation of the BRI. This project was co-financed by the EXIM Bank of China and
the Ethiopian government. Besides, this project was constructed by a huge SOE - China
Communications Construction Company (CCCC) that completed in May 2014.
Subsequently, the Ethiopian Toll Roads Enterprise (ETRE) has started managing the
Addis Ababa-Adama expressway payment system, which has been providing payment
services for the last five years. During this period, ETRE has collected 965 million ETB in
revenue while handling 31 million vehicles. Thus far, the revenue generated is less than 10%
of the total project construction expenditure. Failure to collect 1 billion ETB in five years has
been a blow to the government. Surprisingly, without the return of the Addis Ababa-Adama
expressway loan, the Xinhua News noted on its website on June 20, 2019 that the EXIM Bank
of China financed 85% of the construction of the inauguration of the second toll road - Dire
Dawa-Dewalle expressway. It is not exaggerating to say that the country has begun the
downhill path along with its growing debt burden.
On the other hand, in the first edition of the GTP, the Ethiopian Sugar Corporation
(ESC) announced that, out of the total 10 sugar factories, seven of them were said to start
production at the end of 2015, enabling the country to produce millions of metric tonnes of
refined sugar but the corporation failed to complete a single project due to corruption, lack of
social impact assessment by the Indian contractors(Kumar, 2016; Sequeira, 2019). As a result,
India is practicing debt-trap diplomacy in Ethiopia especially on sugar project contracts and
Ethiopia is struggling with Indian growing debt burden. For instance, India has agreed to
‘support’ three different sugar factories in Ethiopia (Kumar, 2016) and as per an Addis
Fortune article on June 29, 2009,the Ethiopian government signed an Engineering,
Procurement and Construction (EPC) contract with two different Indian private limited
companies - the Overseas Infrastructure Alliance (OIA) and the Uttam Sucrotech
International.
The OIA signed a US$367 million project contract for the set-up and construction of
the Tendaho sugar factory in Afar region, north-eastern Ethiopia, that has been made an
advance payment of US$16.6 million and a US$132 million contract to commence the
expansion project of Fincha sugar factories in eastern Wellega Zone of Oromia region both in
2009 (Kumar, 2016). Similarly, Uttam Sucrotech, was awarded the US$141 million contract

23
in 2010 to commence the Wonji sugar project expansion in east Oromia region(Kumar, 2016).
Tendaho sugar factory is the biggest plant in Ethiopia; it represents an ambitious initiative
and will take the lion’s share of the total amount of sugar produced in the country. The
scheduled date of completion of both Tendaho and Fincha sugar factories were in 2011, the
ESC stated on its website on January 22, 2019thatTendaho’s first phase factory started trail
production in October 2014. On the other hand, the scheduled date of completion of Wonji
sugar factory, which is the oldest and the pioneer in the history of Ethiopia’s sugar industry,
was June 2012. As yet, there is no concrete evidence that shows these three factories are fully
operational and the country has no record of exporting sugar in a decade.
Furthermore, according to the website post on Ethiopian Review on March 28, 2009,
for the commencement of the above three sugar project contracts, the EXIM Bank of India
provided lines of credit worth US$640 million and according to the agreement signed by the
two governments, the fund was made at an interest rate of 1.75%. Moreover, the agreement
demands that 85% of the total project works should be handled by Indian firms only. On top
of that, the Thaindian News mentioned on its website on August 2, 2009 that Uttam
Sucrotech and the OIA, which have been selected as the EPC had disputed over the award of
the sugar project contracts. Subsequently, the dispute was handled by the Bombay High
Court and a few months later the conflict (which stalled the project) was resolved through the
intervention of the Indian government.
Overall, the target of the sugar project was to meet growing domestic demand, to
boost foreign currency earnings from the export, to create employment opportunities, and to
extricate the nation out of poverty. However, demand continues to outstrip local production
capacity. Ethiopia is suffering from shortage of sugar and for the past decade, the country’s
domestic demand has been rising sharply (Kumar, 2016). As yet, both the expansion and the
brand new sugar development projects are incomplete and according to the Capital Ethiopia
Newspaper published on May 30, 2018, due to the gap between the local factory production
and the demand of the society, the ESC has been averagely importing about200,000 metric
tons of sugar per year. Thus, the slow progress in India’s development cooperation projects in
Ethiopia’s sugar industry as well as internal problems of the country brought social, political
and economic challenges. Consequently, this issue raises doubts about the effectiveness and
efficiency of India’s development cooperation.

24
China and India in Africa: Some insights

Since the 1990s, the focus of international politics and international relations has been
shifting from military and security dominance to political and economic ideological
dominance (Bulhan, 2015; Ocheni and Nwankwo, 2012).Several countries regard promoting
their own economic development, enhancing their soft power and improving their
international image as the main tasks of foreign relations, and precisely Africa is the
playground. The developed countries are trying to advance resources and markets in less
developed countries. Particularly, economically-developed countries want to expand their
spheres of influence on resource and market developments in Africa; this has led to war
without gunpowder (Addis and Zuping, 2018).
India and China are both the most important developing countries in the world. Their
national conditions are very similar, and they are the fastest-growing emerging economies in
the world(Addis and Zuping, 2019). Additionally, China and India have a long-term
economic cooperation and relationship with Africa, with a deep historical and practical
foundation for economic cooperation, and China's achievements in Africa are temporarily
ahead of India's (Akyeampong and Fofack, 2019; Chakrabarti and Ghosh, 2014; Mao and
Tang, 2016).In the last few years, China and India have been strengthening their presence and
influence in Africa, which is seen both as an opportunity and a threat. Africa is an extremely
important part of China’s and India’s current international strategy, which plays an important
role in ensuring political and economic security, as well as enhancing international influence
(Chakrabarti and Ghosh, 2014; Mao and Tang, 2016). Therefore, the comparative study
between China and India on African political, economic and social diplomacy has practical
significance. Furthermore, while aid, investment, trade, loans, and other policy frameworks
and motivations from China and India towards Africa are documented (Panda, 2016), as yet,
little attempt has been made to evaluate the factual impact of their economic activities on the
development of the continent.
Three strands of school of thoughts dominate the historical and contemporary
discourse about the presence of Asian drivers in Africa, such as optimistic, sceptic and
pessimistic school of thoughts. This study assesses optimistic and pessimistic schools of
thoughts that dominate the contemporary discourse based on debt-trap diplomacy and land
grabbing approach.
From the optimistic perspective, China and India have been increasing their
footprints in Africa since 1990s through various frameworks including the near future policy,

25
Beijing’s BRI, the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC), New Delhi’s Focus Africa
and Techno-Economic Approach for Africa-India Movement (TEAM-9), Pan African e-
Network Project (PAENP), and India–Africa Forum Summit (IAFS)(Khan and Arora, 2017;
Krishna, 2010; McCormick, 2008). Their contribution to the continent was widely regarded
as positive (Addis and Zuping, 2019). China has made outstanding achievements in Africa's
infrastructure, manufacturing capacity and energy development, while India is slightly better
at IT, medicine and human resources training in Africa (Addis and Zuping, 2019). Moreover,
China and India provide independent development capabilities and employment opportunities
to several of African countries (Akyeampong and Fofack, 2019; Addis and Zuping, 2019).
The amount of Chinese and Indian development assistance going to Africa has been
escalating exponentially. Although it is believed that there are political strings attached to
loans and aid from China and India these external flows are often considered more efficient
and attractive by African countries than those from traditional donors (Li, 2017; McCormick,
2008).
Pessimistically, China and India have been viewed as the emerging colonial powers in
Africa seeking energy resources (Addis and Zuping, 2019). Over the past decades,
China’s overseas lending to developing countries has surged, causing debt levels to jump
dramatically, increasing vulnerabilities of debt and reasons for debt anxieties(Horn et al.,
2019). According to the Kiel Institute for the World Economy, a think-tank based in
Germany, almost half of China's debt to developing countries are opaque, in their word
‘hidden debts’ (Horn et al., 2019). Most developing countries are these days confronted with
debt issues. Since the year 2012, average public debt in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) has
substantially increased and China is in the driver’s seat when it comes funnelling funds into
the region by means of debt (Battaile et al., 2015; Horn et al., 2019).
Due to the low levels of savings and low productivity, there are apparent financial
gaps issues in SSA countries (Shawa, 2016), particularly in Ethiopia (Baye, 2017; Shimelis,
2014). Low levels of savings would cause high debt, increasing vulnerabilities and debt
stress. To compensate for the lack of foreign capital and to boost the economic growth,
Ethiopia receives loans from international organization as well as various countries including
China. Ethiopia is the second largest recipient of loans from China in SSA, next to Angola
(Vasquez, 2019). Such far-reaching default could produce opportunities for lender to crave
the region's natural resources. For instance, in order for Angola to repay China’s debt, the
government ships specific quantities of its oil to China (Corkin, 2011; George, 2016).

26
Furthermore, Ronak Gopaldas, Institute for Security Studies Consultant and Director at
Signal Risk (South Africa), on February 21st, 2018, after eliciting China as a source of
funding to Africa said, ‘there is concern that African states will suffer a similar fate to Sri
Lanka – and unwittingly become pawns in China’s global strategic agenda’(Gopaldas, 2018).
Scholars have been speculating that Kenya would sink into China's debt trap because of the
less operating costs of the Mombasa-Nairobi Standard Gauge Railway project for which, the
loan was provided by China's EXIM Bank(Parker and Chefitz, 2018). China is nota member
of the Paris Club, a group of official sovereign creditor nations, which is another
compounding issue. Concluding that for vulnerable African countries, reliance on China’s
funding could convey a threat to sovereignty.
China and India are handing out loans to Ethiopia and some other African countries
that are ignored by the West to build stadiums, railroads, expressways, hydropower dams,
real-estates, airports, inter alia(Addis and Zuping, 2019). In fact, many of these loans are not
expected to be profitable for these Asian countries. Nevertheless, when these projects fail to
meet the terms of loans, these Asian countries will control these projects to utilize them for
their own interests. Typically, the loaned money is used to pay the project contractors of the
debtor country with some political concessions. For instance, China lends more money to
Djibouti than it can pay back and now China built a large Chinese military base in Djibouti
(Gopaldas, 2018). Moreover, according to scholars report ‘Forty present of countries in the
region are close to falling into debt crisis’ (Searcey and Barry, 2018)including Angola,
Djibouti, Ethiopia, Ghana, the Republic of Congo, Sierra Leone, Zambia, and many of them
are the most indebted to Chinese creditors (Scholvin, 2016;Vasquez, 2019). Understandably,
Angola is the second largest producer of oil in SSA, Sierra Leone has the largest iron ore
deposits in the world, the Republic of Congo is the largest producer of Coltan (used in cell
phones and computer chips) in the world, and Zambia is Africa's second-largest producer of
copper and coal.
Incidentally, beyond the two schools of thought the study found some scholars
defending China’s debt-trap diplomacy to Africa, claiming that the debt-trap diplomacy is not
real but just ‘a rise of meme’ and arguing their point by demonstrating the untruthfulness and
biased media stories (Brautigam, 2020; Carmody, 2020). Genuinely, the hegemonic
knowledge and the existence of monstrous falsification by the modern historians is
tremendous but listening to the heartbeat of the society in the continent by means of survey,
an investigation would help to assess what is really happening on the ground. Brautigam and

27
Carmody are of the stance that China is not deliberately and intentionally trap any country in
the web of debt to secure its strategic advantage. The question is: What does it matter
whether the debt-trap is deliberate if the country has no ability to pay back under the
scheduled period and the project is overtaken by one of China's SOEs? How come creditors
lend cash without project feasibility study? What does the evidence show us as regards how
China changed the debt strategically into securing oil in Angola(George, 2016), port in Sri
Lanka(Davidson, 2018)?
As a point of reminder, Brautigam argued in her book, The Dragon's Gift: The Real
Story of China in Africa, that China's 'embrace of the continent [Africa] is strategic, planned,
long-term, and still unfolding’ (Bräutigam, 2009, 311).Similarly, Carmody argues in his
book, The New Scramble for Africa, that the new powers (China and India) are scrambling
for African resources and enjoying the existence of abundant low-cost labour in the continent.
Accordingly, he warns against the gloomy exploitative strategies of the old as well as the new
powers and he marked that the biggest companies of the new powers are exploiting the
continents resources restlessly, thus, profits mainly flow to these exploiter countries
(Carmody, 2016). Clearly, higher debt loads may induce stress and the existing debt burden
may hinder the borrower from losing sovereign power. In fact, excessive debt impairs the
government’s ability to deliver fundamental services to its citizens. Moreover, whether the
debt-trap diplomacy is deliberate, the debt stress associated with intense poverty in the
continent is escalating as the corresponding debts and becoming hard to repay. Thus, African
countries should refuse some of the projects that are very likely to heavily in debt the
continent without corresponding favourable economic externalities.
On the other hand, India's investment in various regions of Africa has different
priorities. Among them, Eastern Africa has become an important area for Indian enterprises
to invest and trade in Africa because of its geographical proximity and historical ties
(Chakrabarty, 2018; Narlikar, 2010; Nzomo, 2014). In Ethiopia, located in Northeast Africa,
India mainly invests in the agricultural industry, whereas in Kenya, Mauritius, Mozambique,
Tanzania, and Uganda of East Africa, India's investment is substantial and more diversified
(Chakrabarty, 2018; Nzomo, 2014).
Agriculture plays an important role in African countries, and lack of agricultural
development and food security are long-standing problems. Under the impact of the global
food crisis, many constraints in African agriculture are becoming more obvious and have led
to increased activities toward leasing or buying land in Africa for the most part (Hules and

28
Singh, 2017; Michael and Baumann, 2016).Concomitantly, developed and developing
countries including India and to some extent China, have participated in the agricultural
investment activities, which have been described as 'land investment' or 'land grabbing' (Hall
et al., 2015; Hules and Singh, 2017; Michael and Baumann, 2016).With a peak of investment
activity in the year 2007, several hectares of land have been leased and sold in Ethiopia to
various foreign agricultural investors including Indian firms (Cheru, 2016; Hall et al., 2015;
Hules and Singh, 2017). Other than agricultural land acquisition, Indian firms have also
participated in different transportation and sugar industry projects in Ethiopia (Addis and
Zuping, 2019).
To curb and tackle debt vulnerabilities and land-grabbing in Africa countries,
policymakers, international institutions, lenders and borrower countries should work together.
Similarly, on taking up new debts, low-income countries need to precede prudently, boost tax
revenues and attract more FDI. Generally, the analysis shows that due to the multifaceted
nature of the causes of the debt crisis and land-grabbing, creditors and debtors as well as
investors and host countries should agree on the options for dealing with the outcomes.
Additionally, the immediate decision that has to be taken on board is that African countries
with high debt must act decisively and promptly to address their fiscal problems.
Moreover, for Africa to significantly benefit in terms of FDI from China and India,
African governments must prioritize and where necessary, modify future agreements to
promote the investment inflows in sectors with positive linkages with the manufacturing and
industrial activities, local outsourcing of inputs and intermediate production activities. In the
long run, despite competing in Africa, China and India should combine their emerging power
and establish a trilateral partnership to generate stable economic progress and lasting
industrialization in Africa while enjoying abundant energy resources, cheap manpower, and
arable land in the continent.

Results and discussion

This study survey report underscores that roughly 80% of the employees answered, although
the wage is below their living standard, they are satisfied with the work opportunity.
However, they are still expecting some support from the Ethiopian government concerning
the amount of the wage. Clearly, the unemployment rate in Ethiopia is escalating and
regardless of corresponding low wages, these Asian drivers are reducing the unemployment
rate in the country (Addis and Zuping, 2019). Additionally, employees criticized the

29
company’s sick day policy and employees’ safety provision. They explained that it is highly
unlikely to get a sick permission and if an employee continues requesting permissions,
getting back to duty will not be easy. According to our investigation results indicate that local
employees’ annual leave is unthinkable in either Chinese or Indian companies. Roughly,65%
of the employees complain about the less encouragement from the company’s supervisor/
manager and described it is uncommon to obtain. Thus, what are the benefits of Chinese and
Indian projects to the indigenous people? Our study result indicates that Chinese and Indian
investment firms generated job opportunities for the indigenous people but have limited to
skill improvement and low wage. Due to poor implementation and regulations regarding the
diffusion and transfer of knowledge, the skills and technologies transferred from Chinese and
Indian workers to the local economy have been very weak. Sadly, technology transfer and
capacity building to the local societies on several project agreements that Ethiopia made with
the Asian drivers mostly are not implemented but just media value and lip service.
Incidentally, the Ethiopian government’s unclear negotiation and the two Asian
countries providing large amount of credits, particularly on the agricultural and infrastructure
facilities puts most of the society in the position of dilemma. Roughly, 70% of the interview
and discussion participants believe that there is economic support in exchange for political
diplomacy. As per several of our informants, so far many infrastructure projects that are
funded by Asian drivers could not create economic development loan programs that can
repay rather a means of debt burden to the country and embezzlement to some authorities.
Additionally, rights groups have contemplated the fact that few Ethiopian elites are known
for their naked opportunism rather than their leadership qualities and political acumen. These
elites gushingly utilise Ethiopia’s diplomatic support for infrastructure facility relations or
infrastructure for debt-trap diplomacy with both Asian drivers.
On the perspective of the land grabbing, the negative effect still persists especially in
the lowland Ethiopian regions of Benishangul-Gumuz and Gambella. Surprisingly, during
this deadly cycle of drought and famine, the government development plan has been offering
large-scale plots of land at giveaway prices. Local inhabitants do not understand why
Ethiopia, which depends on food aid, is selling arable land to developers to grow biofuel
crops. This large-scale farming land programs completely contradict the government’s
development plan, as per the Investment Proclamation outlines under the Investment
Incentives Regulation No. 270/2012, investors that export above 50% of their output are
guaranteed to obtain over five years of income tax exemption with free custom duty imports

30
of capital goods, spare parts, and limited raw materials. On the contrary, those investors that
export less are entitled to only a two-year tax exemption. Thus, this policy explicitly indicates
that the major purpose of the shift to large-scale agriculture has less to do with domestic food
security, poverty alleviation, ecological and biodiversity resources, but more to do with
foreign exchange earnings.
Moreover, human capital investments are fewer in Ethiopia than other investment
sectors. According to the data from EIC, educational investments from the Asian drivers were
8 projects in total from 1993 to 2016 (see Table 2). Without knowledge and skill embodied in
the local societies, there can be no technological change.
Generally, the major weaknesses of many African governments are project
negotiation and decision-making. This is because grand project deals are mostly going
through high-level government officials. Apparently, there can be a gap between government
official’s political decision and how the deal can be structured in a way that makes economic,
legal and financial sense. No matter what country they are dealing with, it is critical that
African high-level government officials seek out appropriate economic, legal and financial
advisors. During the past two decades, while many countries in the West have largely ignored
the continent, China and India have made it a diplomatic, economic, political and strategic
priority. Beijing and New Delhi see Africa as the perfect hunting ground for overseas
business investment, for securing energy and raw materials, and above all, for expanding
their geopolitical influence.

Conclusion

The escalation of China-African and Indo-African trade and economic relations has opened
the door for Chinese and Indian private and state-owned enterprises to enter Africa, and they
currently operate along the spectrum from large scale investment to retail enterprising. China
emerged as a major trading partner in Africa and is likely to continue to rise, and India has
experienced particularly an impressive growth in its trade relations with Africa. The vast
majority of exports from Africa to both countries are raw materials, such as energy resources,
gold, raw cotton, precious stones, tropical woods, and others. Nevertheless, Africa has a
substantial imbalance in its export-import relationship with both countries (McCormick,
2008; Nowak, 2016; Panda, 2016).
Particularly, although Ethiopia has a strategic partnerships with China and India,
it chronically runs a negative trade balance with both of them and primarily exports

31
agricultural productivity (Cabestan, 2012; Hess and Aidoo, 2015; Jalata, 2014; Leta and
Girma, 2017). In response to this trade imbalance, Ethiopia needs to focus on building
strong institutions, advancing the business climate through infrastructure development,
eliminating bureaucratic problems, and absolute follow-ups of FDI projects flowing from
China and India, besides, significant measures have to be taken to control the relations
between them.
Deficiency of long-term foreign exchange and being a landlocked country, worsened
by meagre export trade performance, has challenged Ethiopia’s ability to repay a bulk of its
national and international loans that financed various projects. Furthermore, financial and
foreign currency challenges along with the country’s growing debt represent challenges to the
development projects. For instance, the due date of loan repayments for the Chinese railway,
express roads, stadiums and light train projects began before the projects were operational.
Similarly, for the loan that has been provided by the Indian government to commence sugar
projects in Ethiopia, its repayment due date began before all the corresponding Indian-related
projects were operational.
Furthermore, China mostly won dozens of contracts and mega projects in Ethiopia
with or without competition. This can be mentioned as an externality of the debt-trap
diplomacy. It can be seen in projects like the Grand Renaissance Dam, wind power
initiative,the Bole International Airport expansions, Addis Ababa ring road, Addis Ababa
light railway initiative, which are among the first in Africa, inter alia(Addis and Zuping,
2019). Similarly, several scholars also mentioned that China’s quest is to gain diplomatic
support and showcase Addis Ababa to other countries in the continent in exchange for
infrastructure and political shield to Ethiopia (Adem, 2012; Cabestan, 2012; Hess and Aidoo,
2015). Particularly, Adem marked that ‘China seeks to gain a diplomatic foothold in
Ethiopia’ (Adem, 2012, 147). Apparently, Ethiopia made many political gestures to China,
for instance, ‘In 2006, the Ethiopian parliament lent its support to China’s anti-secession law
(regarding Taiwan), and as a member of the UN Human Rights Council until 2007, Ethiopia
(along with other African countries) helped defeat all motions criticising the Chinese regime’
(Cabestan, 2012, 54).
Incidentally, over a decade has passed since land grabbing began. Thus far, little
evidence indicates that any of the large plots of land acquired by Indian investors have
produced food value or related products for Ethiopia’s indigenous people. Thus, facilitating
hundreds of thousands of hectares of farm land acquisition is not a solution for Ethiopia’s

32
food security, employment opportunities, or foreign exchange economy unless the
government addresses these issues with no delay. Furthermore, as per the publication of
William Davison on the Ethiopian News website on November 26, 2013, the former Prime
Minister Hailemariam Desalegn himself conformed that ‘We’ve given more than 400,000
hectares of land to the private sector to engage in this agricultural production, but up to now
the progress is very slow’. This statement indicates that putting land in the hands of investors
provides no guarantee of attaining the expected results. Furthermore, grievances over land
have been central to the recent protests in Ethiopia that led Prime Minister Desalegn to
resign.
Presently, several international players are rushing to finance various kinds of projects
in African countries. China and India will be at a disadvantage if they do not proactively
engage in strengthening and deepening development partnerships with the continent. As an
emerging power, these two Asian countries have to persuade its partners about the advantages
of their development assistance that adheres to the principles of equality, mutual benefit and
horizontal cooperation.

33
Conflicts of Interest
The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Author Contributions
Amsalu K.: conceptualization, conduct the survey, data gathering and analysis, revisions,
development, and proofreading of the article. Simplice A. and Zuping Z.: data analysis,
supervise, revisions, development, and proofreading of the article. Hailu Kendie A. and
Eshetu S.: revisions, development, and proofreading of the article.

Funding
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship
and/or publication of this article: This paper was supported by the National Natural Science
Foundation of China(NSFC)under grant number: 19AGL017. We would like to show
gratitude to the National Natural Science Foundation of China for their research funding
support. The funders have no role in the design, development, and submission of the study to
the journal.

34
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